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DOE Unveils Goal To Remove Gigatons Of Carbon Dioxide From Atmosphere

November 8, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 8, 2021

U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm on Nov. 5 announced the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) new goal to remove gigatons of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere and store it for less than $100/ton of net CO2-equivalent.

The “Carbon Negative Shot,” the third target within DOE’s Energy Earthshots Initiative, is the U.S. government’s first major effort in carbon dioxide removal, DOE said.

The Earthshots Initiative aims to accelerate breakthroughs of more abundant, affordable, and reliable clean energy solutions within the decade.

Carbon dioxide removal is defined as a wide array of approaches that capture CO2 directly from the atmosphere and durably store it in geological, bio-based, and ocean reservoirs or in value-added products to create negative emissions.

DOE said that nearly all climate and energy models that reach net-zero indicate the need for a near-term focus on CO2 removal development and deployment to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. By midcentury, carbon dioxide removal will need to be deployed at the gigaton scale, according to DOE.

President Joseph Biden has set a goal of achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by no later than 2050.

Carbon dioxide removal technology “still requires significant investments in research and development to create a cost-effective and economically viable technology that can be deployed at scale and in time to meet the urgent needs of the climate crisis,” it said.

DOE said four performance elements will define the technologies DOE will advance through Carbon Negative Shot:

Additional information about the initiative is available here.

Other Earthshots Initiatitives

Other Earthshots Initiatives involve hydrogen and long duration energy storage.

In June 2021, DOE launched an effort to reduce the cost of clean hydrogen by 80% to $1 per kilogram in one decade.

The following month, Granholm announced DOE’s new goal to reduce the cost of grid-scale, long duration energy storage by 90% within the decade.

Groups Support NERC Proposed Revisions Submitted To FERC

November 8, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 8, 2021

The American Public Power Association (APPA), the Large Public Power Council (LPPC) and the Transmission Access Policy Study Group (TAPS) said in joint comments submitted to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) that several of the changes resulting from proposed rules of procedure (ROP) revisions would appropriately implement the North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s (NERC) risk-based Compliance Monitoring and Enforcement Program (CMEP).

The groups urged FERC to approve the proposed changes.

At issue are ROP revisions filed by NERC and its six regional entities. As NERC explains in its filing, the proposed revisions to the ROP are designed to enhance NERC’s risk-based approach to monitoring and enforcing compliance with the NERC reliability standards and to enhance the ROP to add clarity and simplify unduly burdensome administrative business practices.

APPA, LPPC and TAPS noted that they have long supported a risk-based approach to NERC’s compliance monitoring and enforcement program, and said the proposed revisions to the ROP are appropriately aimed at reducing unnecessary burdens on NERC and registered entities while enhancing the effectiveness of the risk-based compliance monitoring and enforcement program approach.

The ROP revisions included in the September 29, 2021 filing were informed by substantial industry input.

APPA, LPPC and TAPS submitted detailed comments on NERC’s initial draft ROP changes, expressing general support for improved risk-based compliance, while providing a number of proposed changes, clarifications, and questions.

“The Public Power Trade Associations appreciate NERC’s consideration of these comments, and the alterations made to the proposed ROP in response. While not incorporating every comment in full, NERC responded meaningfully to the issues raised by the Public Power Trade Associations,” APPA, LPPC and TAPS said.

Such collaboration ultimately enhances the compliance monitoring and enforcement program by minimizing disputes over the CMEP’s rules, and by fostering confidence that industry perspectives on risk-based compliance are being heard, the groups said.

They highlighted the change reflected in a revised ROP section that would grant the relevant Compliance Enforcement Authority discretion as to when to conduct compliance audits rather than requiring an audit every three years, regardless of reliability or security justification.

APPA, LPPC and TAPS endorsed this change as advancing the risk-based approach to the compliance monitoring and enforcement program “and we urge the Commission to accept NERC’s proposed ROP revisions on this issue.”

They also endorsed NERC’s proposed changes to the evidence retention period for compliance audits.

Consistent with the recommendations of NERC’s recently concluded Standards Efficiency Review initiative these revisions would ensure adequate evidence to support compliance reviews, while reducing registered entities’ administrative burden and costs, the groups said. The proposed evidence retention change, as well as the other ROP revisions included in the September 29 filing, should be approved, they added.

Ithaca, N.Y., Votes To Electrify And Decarbonize Building Stock

November 7, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 7, 2021

The City of Ithaca, N.Y., recently voted to electrify and decarbonize its building stock. The city’s contract with BlocPower, a New York-based climate tech startup focused on greening aging urban building, represents the first large-scale, city-wide electrification initiative in the U.S., and a major step forward in Ithaca’s plan to become carbon-neutral by 2030, BlocPower said.

Ithaca’s Common Council on Nov. 3 voted to empower Ithaca Mayor Svante Myrick to negotiate a contract with BlocPower, which the city’s Planning and Economic Development Committee unanimously approved to manage the project after ratifying the results from its Energy Efficiency Retrofitting and Thermal Load Electrification RFP on October 20.

Building electrification is a key part of Ithaca’s Green New Deal.

BlocPower’s proposal estimates that the installation of air source heat pumps paired with supporting energy efficiency upgrades and other building improvements will cut Ithaca’s 400,000 tons of carbon dioxide by 40% and create 400 new green economy construction, technology and management jobs.

At the same time, it will make financing green energy upgrades affordable by providing low-cost loans to building owners, which they will pay back through the significant energy cost savings received, according to BlocPower.

Additional information about BlocPower is available here.

APPA-Funded Logan City Light & Power Energy Storage Project Advances

November 5, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 5, 2021

Pine Gate Renewables on Nov. 3 said that it has won a competitive bid with Logan City Light & Power (LL&P) to build a stand-alone energy storage system in Logan, Utah.

In 2020, LL&P received a $125,000 grant from the American Public Power Association’s Demonstration of Energy & Efficiency Developments (DEED) program to help fund the project. 

Providing 0.125 megawatts/0.5 megawatt hours (MWh) of backup energy for the grid, the Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) will be designed and integrated with the city’s System Operational Control Center, which monitors the municipal electricity distribution system, power plants, power contracts and call center. 

It will also be able to accommodate the area’s wide range of changing seasonal temperatures and elevation in northern Utah. 

“The LL&P energy storage project is another example of how public power utilities are at the forefront of innovation,” said Michele Suddleson, Director of R&D Programs at APPA. “It is also illustrative of how the DEED program helps public power utilities to improve their operations and services through grant funding.”

The project will use the Eos Znyth Gen 2.3 battery and Nikola Power’s Intellect Plus Energy Management System.

The Eos system, a zinc hybrid battery, along with Nikola Power’s Intellect Plus Energy Management System, has the ability to charge and discharge energy on a predetermined schedule as needed to allow for demand charge reduction, provide backup power to critical loads and supply additional grid services to maintain reliable continuity of service for the residents of the community. 

The BESS dispatches power during peak demand hours and ultimately delivers cost savings to customers. 

Blue Ridge Power will conduct the engineering, procurement and construction for the project, which is expected to be operational by late 2022. 

Pine Gate has more 12 gigawatt hours of storage in development either as stand-alone or combined with solar projects across the country. Its most recent solar plus storage project was Grissom Solar in Enfield, N.C., which went online earlier this year and provides 10 MWh of energy storage. 

DEED members can access reports on this and other projects in the DEED research library. The library is key word and topic searchable.   

Quarterly reports keep DEED members up to date on current projects, such as Logan’s storage project, and once a project is completed, the results, lessons learned, and any resources created to assist other utilities in replicating a similar project are shared in the library.

APPA Storage Tracker

The American Public Power Association recently launched a Public Power Energy Tracker, which is a resource for association members that summarizes energy storage projects undertaken by members that are currently online. The tracker is available here.

NREL Study Compares Storage, Energy Efficiency Building Stock Benefits

November 4, 2021

by Peter Maloney
APPA News
November 4, 2021

Pairing energy efficiency, rather than energy storage, with a renewable energy portfolio is more cost effective at achieving 100 percent renewable power for the nation’s building stock, according to a new study from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

As more states, cities, and municipalities commit to reducing their environmental impact by shifting to 100 percent renewable energy sources, the dominant challenge will be the long-duration misalignment of supply and demand, Sammy Houssainy and William Livingood, the authors of the report, Optimal Strategies for a Cost-Effective and Reliable 100% Renewable Electrical Grid, argue.

While energy storage can address that misalignment, the report, published in the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, found that alternative and readily available solutions are more cost effective and should be considered first. “Minimizing long-duration storage is a key element in trying to achieve the target cost effectively,” Houssainy said in a statement.

Using a techno-economic analysis, the authors said they identified cost-optimal, region-dependent, supply-side, and demand-side strategies that reduce, and in some regions eliminate, the otherwise “substantial capacities and associated costs of long-duration energy storage.”

The supply-side strategies investigated included optimal mixes of renewable portfolios and oversized generation capacities. Demand-side strategies considered included building load flexibility and building energy efficiency investments.

The results, the author said, “reveal that building energy efficiency measures can reduce long-duration storage requirements at minimum total investment costs.”

Their analysis showed that a combination of optimally mixed renewable resources, oversized generation capacities, and building energy efficiency investments can eliminate the need for long-duration energy storage in some U.S. regions, the authors said. “This is particularly important given that most long-duration storage technologies are either geologically constrained or still underdeveloped,” they wrote.

The study analyzed prototype building models in climate zones represented by five cities – Tampa, Fla.; El Paso, Texas; New York, Denver, and International Falls, Minn. – and found that the optimum renewable mix generally favors higher wind power allocations in colder climates and higher solar photovoltaic allocations in hotter climates.

For example, the authors said, Tampa would generate all of its electricity from solar panels, while International Falls would receive 100 percent from wind turbines in order to have the least reliance on energy storage.

The report also modeled oversizing renewable generation sources as a means of reducing energy storage needs and found that it can reduce energy storage requirements by ensuring that loads are met during times of otherwise inadequate supply.

Even though oversizing may require curtailing excess power during periods of abundant supply, the authors said oversizing “can have substantial impacts on storage capacities, and in some cases potentially eliminating the need for storage.”

“Our results reveal that cost-optimal renewable production factor ranges from 1.4 to 3.2, and optimal energy efficiency penetrations range from 52% to 68% savings, depending on the climate region,” they wrote. “Therefore, the benefits of excess generation capacities and building energy efficiency measures are outweighed by their incremental investments.”

Maine Chapter Of Sierra Club Backs Public Power Effort In The State

November 4, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 4, 2021

The Maine Chapter of the Sierra Club has endorsed Our Power’s effort to create a statewide, consumer-owned utility.

A 2022 ballot referendum would create the Pine Tree Power Company, a locally-owned, not-for-profit electric utility for parts of Maine currently served by Central Maine Power (CMP) and Versant.

Our Power is a coalition of ratepayers, businesses, energy experts, conservationists, community members, and dozens of grassroots organizations coming together for lower rates and a more reliable, cleaner grid.

The Maine Chapter of the Sierra Club noted that the Pine Tree Power Company would be governed by a publicly chosen board and focused on meeting goals for clean energy independence, lower costs and increased reliability.

The environmental group also noted that consumer-owned utilities are leaders in reducing carbon emissions and combating climate change.

Our Power is recruiting volunteers to gather signatures to put the Pine Tree Power proposal on the ballot. The goal is 80,000 signatures by January.

In related news, Our Power said that on Nov. 2 it fanned out across the state with over 200 volunteers collecting signatures at hundreds of polling locations.

Campaign manager Stephanie Clifford said, “Our signature collecting results exceeded expectations.”

Maine Rep. Seth Berry, who sponsored legislation that called for the creation of Pine Tree Power, discussed the legislation in a recent episode of the American Public Power Association’s Public Power Now podcast.

Maine Gov. Janet Mills over the summer vetoed the bill.

Salt River Project Rolls Out Solar Program For Residential, Small Business Customers

November 3, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 3, 2021

Arizona public power utility Salt River Project (SRP) recently unveiled a new program for residential and small business customers interested in supporting large-scale solar energy growth.

Customers enrolled in SRP Solar Choice can choose to offset half or all their energy use with solar energy by paying as little as a half a cent per kilowatt-hour (kWh) on top of their current monthly price plan with SRP.

The program offsets the monthly energy use from enrolled customers’ homes or businesses with energy from SRP’s growing portfolio of utility-scale solar plants around the state.

SRP Solar Choice program replaces SRP’s legacy EarthWise Energy and community solar programs.

With SRP Solar Choice, customers pay a half a cent per kWh premium on top of their current price plan. This price is 50 percent less than SRP’s previous EarthWise Energy program, the utility noted.

For example, if a residential customer uses 1,500 kWh each month and chooses to offset 100 percent of household energy use, the SRP Solar Choice premium the customer pays would be $7.50 for the month. If the same customer chooses to offset fifty percent of energy use, the premium would be $3.75.

Customers who enroll in SRP Solar Choice also have the option to unenroll from the program if they so choose.

APPA Joins State And Local Stakeholders To Oppose “Minimum” Tax On Bond Interest

November 3, 2021

by APPA News
November 3, 2021

The American Public Power Association (APPA) has joined with other state and local stakeholders in opposition to the inclusion of municipal bond interest in a new Corporate Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) included in the latest draft of the Build Back Better Act.

In their Nov. 1 letter to congressional leaders, APPA and the other groups note that tax-exempt bonds are the primary mechanism through which state and local governments raise capital to finance a wide range of essential public projects.

“This includes not only local roads, highways, and bridges, but also — among other things — airports, public transportation, affordable housing, water and wastewater, schools, libraries, town halls, nonprofit hospitals and universities, police and fire stations, and electric power and gas facilities. These are the investments that make our communities livable and commerce possible,” the letter said.

“Above all else, our groups are committed to minimizing the cost of financing these projects — costs that must be paid by our communities -– by preserving the tax exemption on municipal bonds,” the groups said in the letter.

The groups voiced alarm that section 138101, Corporate Alternative AMT, of the Rules Committee Print of the Build Back Better Act would impose a 15 percent minimum tax on tax-exempt bond interest for purchasers that currently hold about one quarter (or just under $1 trillion) of outstanding tax-exempt municipal bonds.

“Ultimately, this tax will not be borne by corporations, but by our communities, in the form of higher interest demanded by bondholders,” the letter went on to say.

“Our organizations are currently analyzing the effect of this provision, but we know that the Congressional Research Service estimates that subjecting private activity bonds to the individual AMT has raised the interest cost of those bonds by 50 basis points. Again, we do not know whether the effect would be identical, but can safely conclude that subjecting an even broader array of state and local government and non-profit bonds to this new tax will raise community borrowing costs.”

APPA and the other groups said that considering the size of the municipal bond market, with over $4 trillion in debt outstanding, “the costs will be significant and, again, will be borne by our communities, not by the holders of the bonds.”  

At the same time, provisions that would improve municipal finance by increasing flexibility and decreasing costs were excluded from the Rules Committee Print despite being approved by the House Committee on Ways and Means earlier this year. These include provisions to reinstate the ability to issue tax-exempt advance refunding bonds, to increase the small issuer exception from $10 million to $30 million, and to restore and expand the use of direct-pay bonds. “It is inconceivable that neither of the two infrastructure bills currently being considered by Congress include provisions to improve infrastructure financing,” the groups said.

Cities, counties and states will need to partner with the federal government in carrying out the policies proposed in Build Back Better, “but these added costs will severely impact our ability to do so,”: the letter states.

As a result, the groups urged the House and Senate to amend section 138101 of the Rules Committee print to exclude tax-exempt bond interest from the proposed Corporate AMT.

Specifically, for purposes of calculating the AMT, adjusted financial statement income should be decreased by interest that is excluded from gross income under Internal Revenue Code Section 103.

“We would also strongly urge the House and Senate to include the elements of our bond modernization agenda, including reinstating the ability to issue tax-exempt advance refunding bonds, increasing the small issuer exception from $10 million to $30 million, and restoring and expanding the use of direct-pay bonds.”

Lazard Reports Show Continued Cost Declines For Renewables, Energy Storage

November 3, 2021

by Peter Maloney
APPA News
November 3, 2021

A trio of recently released reports shows that the cost of renewable energy continues to decline while energy storage costs were mixed and the use of hydrogen as a fuel remains dependent on availability and technology costs.

“Our three studies together document the continued acceleration of the energy transition,” George Bilicic, vice chairman and global head of the power, energy and infrastructure group at financial advisory firm Lazard, said in a statement. “We’re also seeing that the transition will not be dominated by any one solution — rather a new ‘all of the above’ approach, which includes renewable energy, storage, hydrogen and other solutions, will be key to effecting the permanent shift to increased energy efficiency and sustainability.”

Renewable Energy

Lazard’s latest annual Levelized Cost of Energy analysis (LCOE 15.0) shows the cost of onshore wind and utility-scale solar continues to be competitive with the marginal cost of coal, nuclear and combined cycle gas generation.

When government subsidies are included, the LCOE of onshore wind averaged $25 per megawatt hour (MWh), and utility-scale solar averaged $27/MWh, while the marginal cost of coal-fired generation averaged $42/MWh, nuclear’s average marginal cost was $29/MWh, and the average marginal cost of combined-cycle gas generation was $24/MWh, according to the Lazard report. The report put the midpoint of the unsubsidized LCOE of offshore wind at $83/MWh.

While the rate of decline in the LCOE for onshore wind and utility-scale solar have slowed in recent years, the pace of decline for utility scale solar continues to be greater than that for onshore wind, the report found, noting that the average compound annual decline in LCOE of utility-scale solar was 8 percent over the past five years, compared with 4 percent for onshore wind.

And even though projects entering operation in 2021 were included in the report, Lazard cautioned that commodity cost inflation, supply chain disruption and accelerating downstream demand for renewable energy could put upward pressure on project capital costs that could become evident in future iterations of the firm’s LCOE report, though those increases might not necessarily translate into higher relative costs.

Energy Storage

Lazard’s latest annual Levelized Cost of Storage analysis (LCOS 7.0) showed mixed year-over-year changes in the cost of storage across use cases and technologies, driven in part by the confluence of emerging supply chain constraints and shifting preferences in battery chemistry.

“Industry preference is increasingly shifting towards Lithium-Iron-Phosphate (LFP) technology, which is less expensive than competing lithium-ion technologies, especially in shorter-duration applications, and has more favorable thermal characteristics, despite its relatively lower volumetric energy density,” according to the Lazard report.

In addition, other factors – such as supply constraints in commodity markets and manufacturing activities – are adding to inflation and putting pressure on energy storage capital costs, Lazard said.

The report also noted that hybrid applications, such as combining energy storage with solar power installations to mitigate renewable resource intermittency, are “becoming more valuable and widespread as grid operators begin adopting Estimated Load Carry Capability (ELCC) methodologies to value resources,” the report said.

Hydrogen

Lazard’s Levelized Cost of Hydrogen (LCOH 2.0) report showed that the cost of hydrogen is still largely dependent on the cost and availability of the energy resources required to produce it.

Most hydrogen is currently produced from fossil fuels using steam-methane reforming and methane splitting processes, producing “gray” hydrogen as distinct from “green” hydrogen produced from water and electricity generated by renewable resources.

In its analysis, Lazard did not include a cost of carbon dioxide calculation or government support mechanisms, though the authors said such considerations could be “impactful.” The analysis also did not include potentially significant factors such as conversion, compression, transmission or storage costs.

The intent of the analysis was to benchmark the LCOH of green hydrogen on a dollars per kilogram I$/kg) basis so that stakeholders could compare the cost of green hydrogen to other forms of energy in particular use cases, Lazard said. 

And while green hydrogen is “currently more expensive than the conventional fuels or hydrogen it would displace,” it has the potential to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in traditionally “hard-to-decarbonize sectors such as transportation/mobility, heating, oil refining, ammonia and methanol production, and power generation,” the report found.

Senate Committee Advances Nomination of Phillips To Be FERC Commissioner

November 3, 2021

by Paul Ciampoli
APPA News Director
November 3, 2021

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Nov. 2 voted to advance the nomination of Willie Phillips, Jr. to be a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).

Phillips, a Democrat, is currently Chairman of the Public Service Commission (PSC) of the District of Columbia.

Phillips’ nomination will require confirmation by the Senate and, if confirmed, Phillips would return FERC to its full complement of five commissioners after the departure of Commissioner Neil Chatterjee on August 30, 2021. 

He would also give Democrats a 3-2 majority on the Commission. 

The committee approved moving the nomination of Phillips to the Senate floor by voice vote.